Every year at École secondaire Antoine-de-Saint-Exupéry in Montreal staff and students celebrate Black History Month. This year, on Tuesday February 4th, the Passages Canada team will be joining them in that celebration.

Students will be invited to share their stories of heritage and identity. They will also hear from visual artist Marie-Denise Douyon, a Haitian refugee who sought asylum in Montreal after being arbitrarily arrested by the military junta in power at the time. Prominent community organizer Michael Farkas will share his heritage, traceable back to the Black Loyalists who fled the United States for Canada during the American Revolution. Clément Ndiaye, a regional manager at TD Bank, will describe his experience as a Senegalese immigrant whose first job in Canada was distributing flyers on a street corner.

This event will showcase stories of Montreal’s Black communities through dance, videos and storytelling, so that we all gain a richer understanding of our communities’ roots – where we have come from, and our futures – where we are going. By sharing these different perspectives, we hope to enhance everyone’s appreciation of the Black Canadian experience and start a conversation that will continue in classrooms, in the hallways, and beyond.